Лори Касс - Borrowed Crime

Denise was one of those stocky, energetic women who volunteered for multiple worthy organizations. She’d helped out with area environmental groups, she’d spent time on the local PTA, she’d baked cookies for the Red Cross blood drives, and she was now president of the local Friends of the Library, a volunteer group that raised funds for library projects and donated innumerable hours to helping out at library events.

Though she’d ruffled more than a few feathers with her take-charge attitude and her voice, which I’d heard described as the kind that goes straight into your teeth, I’d always gotten along fine with Denise.

Then again, that could have been due to the simple fact that I hadn’t spent much time with her.

“Eddie,” I said, “was a stowaway on the bookmobile’s maiden voyage. He followed me from the houseboat”—the marina where I moored the boat in summer was a ten-minute walk from the library— “and snuck on board when I was out doing the morning inspection.”

“Well, I know all that.” Denise looked at the cat carrier strapped down next to her feet. “And I know that you didn’t take him out again until that poor little Brynn Wilbanks cried to see the bookmobile kitty.” She paused and slid a glance over to me. “How is she these days?”

“Great,” I said, smiling. “She’s doing just great.” My smile filled me to overflowing, because five-year-old Brynn was still in remission from leukemia. She was doing so well that her mother had enrolled her in kindergarten, and the bookmobile would soon be making a stop at Brynn’s elementary school.

“Good to hear.” Denise nodded. “So, I get why Eddie started coming on the bookmobile, what with Brynn and so many other people liking him. What I don’t get is why you have to keep him a secret from your boss. Keeping secrets from Stephen is a bad idea, Minnie. Trust me on this one.”

I stifled a sigh and yearned for what could not be. My summer volunteer, Thessie, had been a perfect match for the bookmobile, for Eddie, and for me. She was funny, intelligent, and tall enough to reach the bookmobile’s top shelves without having to get on her tiptoes. She was also a senior in high school and aiming for a college major in library science. Bookmobile life would be perfect if Thessie would only drop out of school. If only she would bury her ambitions, to ride on the bookmobile for no pay and no benefits and absolutely no future.

“What’s so funny?” Denise asked.

“Just trying to picture Stephen covered with Eddie hair.”

She leaned forward and reached through the wire door to pet the feline under discussion. “You do have a lot of it, Mr. Edward.”

“Mrr.”

Hmm. Denise was a little pushy and a little too sure of herself when the circumstances didn’t warrant it, but she was a cat person, and Eddie seemed to like her. Maybe he knew something I didn’t.

Denise sighed. “Well, I hope you know what you’re doing with Stephen and all. I mean, I won’t say anything to anyone, but I have to say it’s no wonder you’re having trouble getting people to volunteer. What are you going to do on the days I can’t come out? Because I can’t promise I’ll be able to come with you every time.”

My half smile faded. I stopped thinking about my stick-to-the-rules boss, a man who wore a tie to work every day even though there was no reason to do so, a man who seemed to delight in giving me unachievable goals, a man who wouldn’t blink at firing me if he found I’d been giving bookmobile rides to a creature full of hair and dander. I stopped thinking about all of that and concentrated on keeping my voice calm when I really wanted to shout. Loudly.

“Denise,” I said, “you told me you could help out until next spring. You said you had nothing else going on and that you’d be glad to help keep the bookmobile running.”

“I did?”

She sounded puzzled, and I glanced over. She was pushing her short, smooth brown hair back behind her ears and frowning slightly, deepening the lines that were starting to form in her face.

“Yes, you did,” I said. “Please tell me you haven’t made any other commitments. I just finished the new schedule and I don’t want to have to cancel any stops.”

Making the winter bookmobile schedule had driven me to chocolate more than once. I’d made up the summer schedule with no problems whatsoever, and had blithely assumed that fall would be the same way. My blithe spirit was no longer. Despite my best intentions, the new schedule wasn’t anywhere close to what it had been in summer. But at least I now knew to contact schools and day-care centers in May about their fall programming.

And I also knew that I really needed to find money to hire a part-time bookmobile clerk instead of relying on volunteers.

Back in the days when I’d put together the bookmobile funding and worked though operation issues, the library board had laid down one cast-in-stone rule: no driving alone. I’d agreed readily, and had been happy enough to comply with their policy. Well, I’d once had to count Eddie as my bookmobile companion, but that had been a onetime thing.

Denise laughed. “Don’t be such a worrywart. I’m going to volunteer a few hours a week at the nursing home, is all. Most of the time I’ll be able to work around the bookmobile schedule.”

Most of the time? “And what happens if you can’t?” My voice was going all Librarian. “Denise, if there aren’t two people on the bookmobile, we can’t go out. I need to know in advance if you can’t make a trip. A week, at least.”

“Don’t worry,” she said. “It’ll be fine.”

I wasn’t worrying; I was thinking.

It was easy to convince folks that the bookmobile was a worthwhile cause for volunteering; all I had to do was give them a quick tour of our three thousand books, CDs, DVDs, and magazines, and tell them about the happy smiles on every face that came aboard. Selling people on how important the bookmobile was to the hundreds of people in the county who couldn’t get to Chilson, home to the only brick-and-mortar library in the county, was the easy part.

The problem was, since Thessie had gone back to school, I’d had a number of people excited about riding along. Unfortunately, almost all had canceled for various reasons, and I’d had to cleverly winnow out a few who I felt might not keep the Eddie secret. Denise was the sole survivor.

What I needed was to hire someone. Or, more accurately, what I needed was to find the funds to hire someone. Until then, I had to rely on volunteers. And if Denise wasn’t going to be reliable, I’d have to find someone else. Only who?

Thinking hard, I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel. Thought some more. Tapped. Thought.

Then the sun broke through the clouds, skidding bright light across the countryside, and I stopped thinking so hard. It was turning into a beautiful day. Why ruin it with thinking too much?

“Wow. Did you see that?” Denise stretched forward, looking up. “That was one huge woodpecker!”

“Pileated,” I said confidently. It was a newly formed confidence, because I hadn’t known diddly about birds until I started driving the bookmobile. But now that I was out and about so much, I was using the bookmobile’s copy of Birds of Michigan on a regular basis. The two weeks when someone had checked it out had been two very long weeks.

“Really?” Denise twisted in her seat, tracking the bird. “That’s neat. I bet you see a lot of nature stuff. Have you ever come close to hitting a deer?”

“No, and I hope I never do.”

She laughed. “You mean ‘not yet.’ It’s just the way things are. And deer season starts on Saturday. When those rifle hunters get out in the woods, the deer will start moving around.”